College Football Nation: Conference title conundrum

Friday

Nov 30, 2007 at 12:01 AMNov 30, 2007 at 6:17 AM

There's a discrepancy in college football that puts potential national title contenders at a major disadvantage -- and it has nothing to do with the ebbs and flows of talent. The 36 BCS teams that play in the Atlantic Coast Conference, Big 12 and SEC have to deal with a conference championship game. The 29 BCS teams that play in the Big East, Big Ten and Pac-10 do not.

Eric Avidon

Discrepancies exist in college football.

This year, for example, the Southeastern Conference and Pac-10 are loaded with strong teams while the Big Ten isn’t. As a result, the teams in those stronger conferences -- no matter who they schedule as their four non-conference opponents -- wind up playing difficult schedules while the teams in the weaker conference get an easier road.

The result is records that don’t necessarily reflect which teams are best: A mediocre team from the weaker conference might wind up with a spectacular record, while those from the stronger leagues end up with mediocre records simply because of who’s on the schedule.

That’s a discrepancy that can’t be helped. It happens in every sport. But there’s another one that puts potential national title contenders at a major disadvantage and has nothing to do with the ebbs and flows of talent.

The 36 BCS teams that play in the Atlantic Coast Conference, Big 12 and SEC have to deal with a conference championship game. The 29 BCS teams that play in the Big East, Big Ten and Pac-10 do not.

That’s not a small discrepancy.

That conference championship is a hard game. It’s a 13th on the schedule, for starters, meaning there’s one more opportunity to slip up. But beyond that, it’s a 13th game against a very good opponent. It’s not a 13th game against a patsy.

"There’s no question that the easiest route to the national championship is without (a conference championship game)," said Virginia Tech coach Frank Beamer, whose team plays Boston College in the ACC Championship Game on Saturday. "You’d like to see all the conferences have it. If one conference has it, all of them do – the Big East, the Big Ten, the Pac-10 – so everybody would be on the same footing.

"If you’re in that hunt, you’re going to play a game you probably have just a 50-50 chance of winning. You’re playing another good opponent. From that standpoint, you’d like for all the conferences to have it."

Right now, there are three teams left with a chance to play for the national championship. Missouri is No. 1 in the BCS standings, followed by West Virginia and Ohio State.

If the season were done, it’d be Missouri against West Virginia in the title game, with Ohio State off to the Rose Bowl to play the Pac-10 champion.

But even though Missouri and Ohio State have finished their 12-game schedules – West Virginia still has a scheduled game with archrival Pitt on Saturday – the Tigers might fall out of the top spot in the standings and the Buckeyes might slide up to No. 2. That’s because Missouri has to play another game.

Missouri faces Oklahoma in the Big 12 championship game. That would be the No. 9 Sooners, the team that has beaten the Tigers. Ohio State, meanwhile, gets to sit back and watch, its schedule done after it beat Michigan a couple of weeks ago.

"It’s never been fair," said Oklahoma coach Bob Stoops, whose team plays Missouri in the Big 12 title game tomorrow night. "In times when you’re not competing for the national championship, it’s pretty darn special. But we’re not on equal ground. I’d like to see everybody play them."

While the conference championship game could kill Missouri’s chances to play in the BCS title game, these finals have benefited teams in the past. Florida, for example, was ranked No. 3 after it finished its 12-game schedule a year ago, trailing No. 1 Ohio State and No. 2 Michigan. But Michigan’s season was done on the third Saturday of November while Florida beat Florida State the final Saturday of the month, then won the SEC championship game the following weekend.

With it’s SEC title game victory, it leaped over the idle Wolverines and into the BCS championship game, where it wiped the field with Ohio State. The Gators used that extra opportunity to impress the voters whose polls account for two-thirds of the current BCS formula -- and they took advantage.

It’s unfair that Missouri has to play Oklahoma this weekend while Ohio State can sit back and watch. It was unfair last year that Florida got play an extra game while Michigan was helpless.

This discrepancy should be dealt with – conference championship games for everyone or no one.

What We Learned

One finished the regular season 7-5. One wound up 5-7. Between them, they’ve won seven national championships since 1983. Between them, they helped make the state of Florida the center of the college football universe over the course of a quarter of a century.

They are, of course, Florida State and Miami.

Both struggled a year ago, but after coaching changes were expected to improve this fall. They didn’t.

Miami made the most dramatic change. The Hurricanes fired Larry Coker, who led Miami to the 2001 national championship and lost the 2002 title game in overtime thanks to a controversial pass interference call. But all the wins those two seasons came with players brought to Coral Gables by previous coach Butch Davis, and then Miami started to slide, until finally finishing last year at 6-6 before barely beating Nevada in its bowl game.

Randy Shannon was hired to take over. But despite his presence, and despite proclamations by many that the talent level is still high at Miami, the Hurricanes finished under .500 and won’t play in a bowl game for the first time in a decade.

"The one thing I did learn from this season is that we are going to develop a team that when things get difficult, we are going to learn how to fight and win games," Shannon said after Miami’s season-ending loss to Boston College. "We have had too many opportunities this year against opponents when we came back. ... When we come back from behind, we have to finish it."

The change wasn’t quite as dramatic in Tallahassee.

Offensive coordinator Jeff Bowden got much of the blame for Florida State’s fall from 15 straight years of top-four finishes to the lower tier of the top 25, and he finally resigned near the end of the season last year. Jimbo Fisher, who was the offensive coordinator at LSU and helped the Bengal Tigers win a share of the 2003 national championship, replaced Bowden.

Like Miami, the common assessment is that there’s still talent at Florida State, but the Seminoles are just one win better than they were at the end of the last year. Last Saturday, the Seminoles got pasted by Florida, losing 45-12 in The Swamp.

"Well, (we’re) not as far (from being good again) as you’d think," said Florida State coach Bobby Bowden during his weekly news conference. "There is no doubt about that. The only way to solve it I think is recruiting."

He added, "I’m disappointed we didn’t win more ball games. That’s the big thing. The bottom line is winning. I think there are areas we made improvement and probably areas where we didn’t."

Florida State and Miami have established winning traditions. Other teams that have such traditions have fallen for a time in the past – think Oklahoma in the 1990s – and then returned to prominence. There’s too much history of victory in Coral Gables and Tallahassee to expect the Hurricanes and Seminoles to be down for good, but the fix that was expected to be quick won’t be so fast.

It’ll take a little more time.

Game of the Week

At the end of the night Saturday, the national championship picture will finally be clear.

Missouri and West Virginia control their fate, while Ohio State quietly sits back and watches -- hoping either the Tigers or Mountaineers slip and the Buckeyes then slide up to one of the top two spots in the BCS standings.

Missouri has the tougher matchup of the two, playing Oklahoma in the Big 12 title game. The two played earlier this season, with the Sooners beating the Tigers, 41-31, in Norman.

"We’ve got a lot of respect for them," said Oklahoma’s Stoops. "It’s an exciting challenge for us and our guys are fired up about the opportunity."

He added, "The teams will tinker with what they’ll do (from the last game). That’s just natural. Some things that you liked you’ll keep and some things you thought weren’t so hot you’ll change. On both sides of the ball and for both teams that will happen. But for the most part you have a good idea of what they like to do, you have experience with their personnel having played them."

Turnovers late in the game were an major factor when Oklahoma beat Missouri on Oct. 13, with the Tigers giving up the ball late as the Sooners pulled away.

"From a defensive standpoint, you create turnovers," said Missouri coach Gary Pinkel. "From an offensive standpoint, you have to protect the football. You give them credit because they made the turnovers (happen) in the fourth quarter. From our standpoint, you aren’t going to win any game if you turn the ball over like we did in the fourth quarter."

West Virginia’s game, at first glance, looks easy. The Mountaineers host 4-7 Pitt. Problem is, the teams hate one another, and upsets sometimes happen under those circumstances.

"We’re going to play a rivalry game against a Pitt team that I think has a lot of talented players," West Virginia coach Rich Rodriguez said. "In a rivalry game, particularly us against Pitt, our guys have a lot respect for the atmosphere and the battle we’re going to have to fight.

"We’re going to have to have a great week of practice to get ready."

If I Had a Ballot ...

1. Missouri (11-1) – The Tigers were unranked in the preseason, and would be one of the most unexpected champions in history if they win their next two.

2. West Virginia (10-1) – After quietly taking care of business after losing to South Florida, the Mountaineers are peaking.

3. Ohio State (11-1) – Wait and see.

4. Kansas (11-1) – The Jayhawks had a great run, but when they finally played another top team it took them too long to adjust.

5. Georgia (10-2) – An SEC title game with the Bulldogs and LSU would have been a great one, but a slip against Tennessee cost Georgia the opportunity.

6. USC (9-2) – Were it not for that inexplicable loss to Stanford, the Trojans might have lived up to that preseason No. 1 ranking.

7. LSU (10-2) – What happened to the defense?

8. Virginia Tech (10-2) – The Hokies have the chance for vengeance tomorrow against Boston College in the ACC championship game.

9. Boston College (10-2) – The Eagles have the chance to show their win over Virginia Tech in Blacksburg was no fluke.

10. Oklahoma (10-2) – The Sooners are now playing the role of potential spoiler.

Eric Avidon is a Daily News staff writer. He can be reached at eavidon@cnc.com or 508-626-3809.